In plants, in which liquids of various kinds are bottled in elongated plastic containers, the containers are fed--empty and randomly--into a hopper. Emerging from this hopper are one or two continuous conveyors, so-called elevators, operating continuously and having successive pick-up teeth, which have seatings in which two or more of these containers can be accommodated in horizontal parallel positions. Whilst the active branch of the elevator is ascending a pushing device (one arranged in each seating) manoeuvres the container up to one end of the pick-up tooth (ejecting therefrom any other container(s) which there may be) and then feeds it into a housing in a drum; from this drum, which rotates near to and in phase with the top of the elevators, the horizontal containers are then conveyed towards devices which manoeuvre them into a vertical position with their necks uppermost and then on towards devices which fill them and seal them.
Heretofore, for containers of restricted cross-section, the active branch of the conveyor has followed initially a path on which containers were conveyed substantially horizontally followed by a path where they were conveyed substantially vertically. It is the horizontal section of the conveyor which initially receives the containers from the hopper and, by suitably controlling how the containers are fed in, a satisfactory pick-up of the containers by the teeth of the elevator is achieved. However, the total distance travelled along the elevator is rather long and therefore it has a large number of pick-up teeth and associated pushing devices: consequently the elevator is expensive, having a significant economic effect on the bottling plant as a whole.
On the other hand, in the case of containers with a relatively larger cross-section, the active (or ascending) branch of the elevator only comprises one section which is inclined close to the vertical; at the point where the chute at the bottom of the aforesaid hopper meets the foot of this inclined section, the pick-up operation becomes something of a problem: in fact, although it should be possible to ensure that containers are picked up by supplying a large number of these containers which the chute then piles up against the foot of elevator, it has been found that the greater the number of these containers, the more the elevator churns them about instead of picking them up. Along the most vertical course of the active branch of the elevator there is also incorporated a device for dealing with containers which have been picked up by the pick-up teeth, but which are lodged in an incorrect position which is able either to eject these containers from the elevator or to make them lie in the correct position. However such devices currently used handle the containers so roughly that, if they have thin walls, they are often irreparably damaged, but nevertheless are returned to the hopper becoming jumbled up with the other undamaged containers.